Who and when brought the relics of St. Clement the Pope to Kiev?
Who and when brought the relics of St. Clement the Pope to Kiev?

Summary/Abstract: For the first half century after the Conversion, the relics of St. Clement the Pope and his disciple Phoebus were the most important Christian relics venerated in Rus’. The relics, allegedly, were brought to Kiev by Prince Volodimer, among his other trophies, from the captured Byzantine city of Cherson upon the Prince’s baptism there in 988. The event is reported by the Primary Chronicle written in 1116. However, there exists a much earlier source, the so-called Reims Gloss, that reports a different story of the relics’ translation. It is based on the testimony of bishop Roger of Châlons who visited Kiev in 1049 and claimed that during the audience with Prince Iaroslav, the ruler of Kiev asserted that he himself went to Cherson and brought the relics to be placed in the Tithe Church of Kiev. The article aims at restoring the value of the Reims Gloss for the reconstruction of cultural conditions in Rus’ in the wake of the conversion. The author suggests that the early annals of Kiev did record the translation of the relics under 1007 and that the endeavor may have been prompted by the missionary visit to Kiev of Bruno of Querfurt that same year.

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